Vice Waypoint is the video game arm of the online website Vice. The media publication has about 3,000 staff across multiple departments covering all manner of topics. They recently laid off 2% of staff according to Variety, which affected 60 layoffs on Friday. One of those laid off was associate editor Mike Diver from Vice’s gaming portal, Waypoint.
Diver took to Twitter to announce his departure from Waypoint, which came by way of a Facebook message informing him that he was let go from the media outlet.
Gotta love the bluntness of Facebook. pic.twitter.com/CH098Yegn7
— ➡ (@MikeDiver) July 21, 2017
This coincides with Variety’s report about Vice letting go of staff beginning July 21st, 2017.
According to Mike Diver, he put in up to a dozen hours a day working at the site, and has been contributing to Waypoint since 2013.
I have worked 10-12 hour days almost every day for two and a half years full time and countless hours part time since the start of 2013.
— ➡ (@MikeDiver) July 22, 2017
Diver is no stranger to #GamerGate. He penned two pieces back in 2014, claiming to be neutral but spending a good portion of his first article condemning #GamerGate’s efforts, which was entitled “Does Someone Have to Actually Die Before GamerGate Calms Down?” that was published on October 14th, 2014, focusing more-so on the harassment narrative.
Diver later put together another piece “GamerGate Hate Affects Both Sides, So How About We End It?”, which was published just barely a week later on October 20th, 2014.
Unlike many other journalists covering the event, Diver did at least acknowledge the dangers of groups like JournoList and the GameJournoPros. A majority of his take on matter centered around the scant threats sent by egg accounts toward various individuals – threats that barely accounted for a percentage of more than a million #GamerGate tweets that took place between August and October of 2014, as noted by Newsweek.
Diver wasn’t exempt from taking shots at the gaming community, as he was clearly against fan-service games like Senran Kagura 2, opting to label those who play it as potential molesters in his September, 2015 article.
Diver also has a single sensationalism entry on his DeepFreeze.it profile, highlighting his take on Mike “Notch” Persson and the debacle involving the term “mansplaining”.
Diver clearly doesn’t have the pedigree of corruption like those from Kotaku or Polygon, but Diver has done plenty to stir the pot and rock the boat in the gaming community when it comes to tackling Social Justice Warrior topics and covering people who have made it a goal to smear the gaming industry from top to bottom.
(Thanks for the news tip Mombot)
